Peaches in winter
by Darkwing-Eli
Summary: What's the secret that makes life worth living? Is it true that we all have a place in the world? Can also a former Gundam pilot be happy? Duo searches for answers. Who or what will give them to him? (One shot)


**Standard disclaimers**: There's nothing mine here, plot apart. So don't sue me because I'm playing with something that doesn't belong to me. I don't gain any money from this. It's just for fun.

**Author introduction**: Hallo to you all and thank you for being here!!! I'm so happy today! It is pretty exciting for me to post this here, since this is the first fiction I wrote in a foreign language. I'm happy! That's all!

Ok, blabbering apart, let's come to the serious introduction.

I don't consider this a real "songfic" - since it came out from a deep side of me and not from the music - but I can say that the song I was listening to fit well with my mood.

It's an Italian song, so I don't expect you to know it but, if you are curious, you can read the lyrics at the bottom of the page, with the translation I gave of it.

And now I wish you a good reading!! (Mistakes apart ^^)

_Dedicated to Loyce, for her priceless help with the translation, to little Alison and to every child living on this crazy planet, so that they could live a peaceful life without wars._

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**Peaches in winter**

**By Darkwing**

"It's over." Duo tasted his words, pronouncing them slowly.

He discovered that they strangely had a new and alien flavor since, for the first time in his life, they tasted of hope and not of death.

"It's over." He repeated, trying to take note of a situation still incomprehensible to him, despite months had passed since the Mariemaia incident.

He took a deep breath, inhaling the cold air of the ending night.

"The. War. Is. Over." He articulated his words clearly, like a child still awkward with the language. "And I won." Whispered, with an incredulous sigh. '_We all won.'_

The boy relaxed upon the protective net that surrounded Howard's floating platform. Naturally, since there wasn't any kind of railing, it had been installed to protect things and people from accidental falls into the sea, and not to be used as a hammock. But to Duo, it had always been something more than a simple security device.

When he had came to Earth, the first time, he had used that platform as a support base during his missions, and at the same time, he had elected the rough rope net as his personal refuge. He had spent hours stretched out on that net, during the night, staring at the stars, lulled by the rhythmic breath of the sea lazily splashing against the side of the platform.

Once Howard had discovered him there, while he was deep in his lonely nocturnal meditations.

When the scientist had asked him what was he doing, he had answered he was pretending to be still in space and that the absolute darkness of the ocean with all those sparkling stars had reminded him his homeland.

The engineer had looked at him in an odd way. Perhaps he had been surprised to receive that kind of answer from the irreverent, reckless kid that Duo was, but he hadn't said anything and had discreetly withdrawn, after having wished him a good night. After all, the old scientist had understood that the answer he had just obtained wasn't the whole truth, but he also had understood that it wasn't the moment for questions. The episode had remained isolated.

Duo was well aware of what he hid under that little vice of his. At the time, that had been the only mean he had found to break the perverted and inhuman rhythm given by his battles.

Of course, it was true he felt at his ease when he was lying over there, in the middle of the night, with his feet hanging out over the ocean water; a water that was changeable like his thoughts and dark like his soul. It was true, in a way, that staying like this made him feel at home. But it wasn't the longing for a homeland, that he had never truly loved, that made him go there every chance he got. He didn't want to remember where he came from, why he was there. On the contrary, he went there to forget.

Duo knew that most of people feared darkness by instinct and that, without a definite reason, they were afraid of the dangers that the shadows could hide. But he had always seen things in a different way. Darkness was his home because it was the only place in which he could hide himself.

Feeling his body hanging in the darkness of the night was the most reassuring sensation he had ever felt. In those moments, when he was relaxed on the net and he knew he was alone, he could imagine having nothing and nobody around him - nothing to destroy and nobody to kill - and he was free. He was able to be the innocent child he had never been and he could finally forget, for a few minutes, the demon that had chosen him as its dwelling.

Duo yawned and stretched out his legs, letting them hang over board.

The sharp wind of the ocean went up his trousers, making cold shivers run along his legs, but he didn't care. He didn't feel cold, but even if he did, he would have gladly tolerated it. He needed to be there that morning.

A bad tempest had occurred the day before and it had gone on the whole night, so Duo didn't sleep well. For this reason, he had thought a lash of fresh and pure air would get him back on his feet again. He had been living on Earth for a few months, but he still had to get used to the unpredictability of the forces of nature.

But it didn't mean he didn't' like it!

Months before, Howard had come and see him to the Hilde's shop on L2 and offered him a job. He had accepted it without too much thinking. He was looking forward to seeing the sea again and the old engineer needed an expert pilot that could test his new aquatic mobile suits.

They were mobile suits that he had purposely equipped for the salvage of wreckages and materials lost on the bottom of the ocean. After two years of war, practically uninterrupted, there was a lot to collect and Duo and Howard had calculated that, just to recover the Libra's fragments that crashed onto Earth, they'd have to work for years.

Duo smiled. A long period of hard and difficult work awaited him, but he wasn't afraid of what he would face. This time he would put his skills to the community's service and, even if he knew he wouldn't ever be freed of the blood burden he was carrying, at least he would have done something good for other people and for himself.

He remembered clearly the day he'd seen one of the new models designed by Howard for the first time.

At first sight the instrumentation of the cockpit had appeared to be familiar to him but then, when the scientist had showed him the controls, he'd noticed a lot of devices that were lacking on his old artificial partner. The long prehensile tentacles belonging to the aquatic mobile suit required a complex equipment to be controlled in a proper way. Howard had explained that, despite all his effort of optimization, he had been forced to install more consoles than he had planned and so, for necessity, they had to take up also the space around the command position. To get round this difficulty, the seat was swivel and it could be easily settled according to the operation the pilot had to accomplish time by time.

Duo had liked it immediately and had playfully nicknamed it _Cuttlefish_ because outside, with all those appendages and the bulky ovoidal hold, it really looked like a huge cuttlefish. Howard had liked that pet name and had decided to keep it.

 Duo remembered the enthusiasm he'd felt when Howard had asked him to test it. He had got on board of his cuttlefishie happy like a child in the Toyland! But once alone in the depth of the ocean, all that ingenuous excitement had dissolved like fire in the vacuum of space.

He had never suffered for claustrophobia before, even when he had passed entire nights in the middle of nowhere, confined inside the cockpit of his _Gundam_; but if in that moment he hadn't been under water, he would have darted out of the _Cuttlefish_ like a cat with the tail ablaze.

He had to call upon all the self-control he had to remind himself he wasn't on _Deathscythe_ and he wasn't maneuvering a lethal beam scythe but some harmless prehensile tentacles.

For a few minutes, he had to struggle against the irrational panic attack that had blinded his sight. Only after experiencing first hand the collateral effects of the _Zero System, he had felt so confused, scared, and powerless. The only difference was that this time he done it all by himself._

Then slowly, he had recovered his control and contact with reality...and he had cried.

Even after all those months, he still couldn't say if they had been tears of fear or relief, or if they'd been the result of a too much time of ignored self-pity. All he could say was that he had cried himself to exhaustion, since he hadn't had any more tears to shed and nothing remained, except for a swelling heart and a light spirit. 

The most amazing thing about that moment was that him - proud supporter of the fact that real men don't cry - didn't feel ashamed for that yielding.

When Howard had called him on the vid-com, he didn't have tried to dissimulate his broken voice and his reddened eyes. He had simply smiled, happy despite everything.

On the other side of connection, the engineer's elderly eyes, always hidden behind those weird shades, had answered with the silence. Then even Howard had smiled and greeted him with his thumb up, in a questioning sign of victory.

Duo had nodded. "Yeah. Here everything's going on smooth as silk, old man. The only thing's that this cuttlefishie moans like a newborn brat." He had said, referring to the still high tone of the running engines.

"Oh, that'll pass quickly. After all, it's an obliged passage, lad." 

Duo had never discovered if Howard had said those words referring to him or to the _Cuttlefish_. But he had to admit, at least with himself, that the whole episode had really been an obliged passage for him. The passage that marked his decisive entrance in the adult world.

Thinking better there was a certain irony in the fact that, after all he had gone trough, he had surpassed himself and he had become a man in the very moment he had stopped trying to act like one.

'_Who knows if when I'll come back home, Hilde'll find me changed? She always says I'll never grow up!_' He wondered briefly, sitting on the net and letting his gaze sweeping over the horizon.

The storm of the previous night was over, but the sea was still sobbing under the effect of the gushing force that had shaken it through to its most inaccessible and secret depths. Far away, where the green-gray waves merged with the sky, the bright pink color of the dawn was making its way among the fringes of the clouds.

Duo stayed for a long moment, staring at that painting drawn by nature.

Sister Helen would say that that piece of art was a gift from God to the whole mankind, but he wasn't sure about it. Of course everybody could look at that wonder and be enchanted by it, but was it really everybody's right to enjoy its most inner essence? And him? Had he this right? Could his eyes look at that holy and alive image and remain scot-free? One day could he have gained the right to be a welcome guest to that colorful spectacle, that everyday gave a new face to the world? Or would he always be a stowaway, forced to spy life from the keyhole? He surely would like to know the answer.

Time passed sliding in silence, since a thin bloody scythe of red light slowly rose among the faint clouds curtains as the cold and clear wind of the winter was gradually blowing them away.

Even if it was just an insignificant slice of light, Duo had to look away and to bow his head to avoid to be blinded by it.

His moment of reflection was over; he had to go. The other guys soon would have joined him on the deck and then they would have had tons of things to do; to remedy to the work lost the day before for the storm. He deftly climbed on the pontoon of the platform and turned again toward the dawn, hesitant.

He half-closed his eyes, turning his face to the rising sun, and breathed deeply the intoxicating breeze full of iodine and saltiness. Then he expelled all the air and breathed again. A pale ray of sun shyly shiltered along the young man cheeks, reddened by the piercing north wind.

Duo had to wait a few minutes to perceive that vague tepidness, but when it touched him, he leaned his head back and let the warmth also caress his neck. Slowly, he began to feel the warmth taking possession of him, penetrating his dark clothes and holding him in an impalpable yet comforting embrace. '_And so the world wants me..._'

Suddenly he opened his eyes, shocked by his behavior. Feeding himself with illusions had never been a part of his way of living. He had never done it even when he was still a child. What was he trying to do with such a foolishness? An embrace? Did he call the effect that a rain of anonymous photons produced on a body on the edge of hypothermia an embrace? He must have slept worse than he had guessed if he had come to think to such silliness! A cup of good hot coffee would put his ducks in a row.

He turned to enter, but the growing warmth of the Sun, that seemed to be glued on his black jacket, made him stop. '_Well...after all it's too soon for breakfast. I can stay a bit more.' He told himself._

Smiling, infected by a sudden happiness, he jumped and let himself fall on the net below, nearly bouncing over it. If he had broken it and he had fallen into the sea, with the temperature of the ocean, he would have survived at most ten minutes before dying frozen. But he didn't care about the danger for a second. The day had begun too well to end badly!

After all maybe sister Helen wasn't wrong. Perhaps it was God the entity he had to thank, or maybe it wasn't - he didn't care so much about the name of whatever had made it possible such a wonderful emotion - but whatever it was, it didn't seem mad at him.

Or maybe the entire world was mad at him and it was all a cunning deception to make him mount again on the net, which within a few seconds would brok killing him by letting him fall into the sea.

Duo laughed. If Heero had heard any of the absurd speeches he was telling himself, he'd said that a simple cup of coffee couldn't repair all the cerebral damage he seemed to suffer! No, more likely Heero wouldn't say anything at all since he was deaf to his chatters, but Hilde would reproach him for his recklessness.

However Heero wasn't there and neither was Hilde, and besides, the net didn't seem having suffered any damage after his jump.

Maybe after all in the world there was still a little place for someone like him.

Could it be possible that he'd finally learned how to live?

He smiled. Life was crazy if such a simple thing had had the power to change him.  How could he have ever guessed it? Inside of him, as he stood in the morning sun, something new had happened; something so unpredictable that he never even dreamed was possible. For the first time, in his short but intense life, he could say he really felt alive.

With a wide smile on his face, he started to think about those that had become most similar to a family he had never had; and he had an idea. Even if each of them showed it in his own particular way, Duo was sure that his love was returned; so he thought it would be right to find a way to thank them and say that, even he was far away, he had found a moment to remember those that cared for him. It would be nice to get them a present. Maybe something that was difficult to find on the colonies.

When he had his flash of inspiration, he jumped on his feet like a spring and almost fell from the net. Yes, it would have been a very good present! They would have been happy!

Jumping like a cricket, he got on the bridge of the floating base and whistling, he headed toward one of the nearest helicopters. In no time, he freed the blades from the constraints that keep them still and entered the cockpit. He proceeded with the usual check-up of the systems in an accurate but quick way, and started the rotor to warm up the engine.

Recalled by the unexpected noise of the leaving helicopter, some of the men that worked for Howard got out from the cafeteria and rushed to see what was going on. The old engineer joined them a few seconds later. Duo noticed he wasn't wearing his usual shades.

"Duo!" He shouted to make himself heard, despite the deafening noise. "What the hell are you doing?"

The boy didn't answer and instead made a question in his turn. "A cargo is leaving for the colonies tomorrow, isn't it?"

"Uh...yes...but why do you ask?"

Duo found that the puzzled look on Howard's face was priceless and burst out with a genuine laugh. "Don't make that face, old man! There's nothing wrong. The fact is that, if the cargo's leaving tomorrow, I've got to hurry if I want to buy some little things to send along on the transport."

The Howard's eyes took a perfect round shape. "What? But we already behind by a day! If you leave, who'll pilot _Cuttlefish?"_

Duo made a vague move with the hand. "Don't worry, I won't be gone long. Besides, I taught Jimmy everything he needs to know; he'll be fine without me for a few hours. And...about the fuel, don't worry. Make a note on my account. Now I've to go. Bye!"

The turbines raised their tone and the accelerated rotor blades pressed the air to the floor, generating a powerful artificial wind.

"But what do to you need to buy that's so important?" Yelled Howard, approaching the window of the aircraft.

Duo slipped on his shades and put up the headset on his ears, then answered shouting. "Peaches."

"What?"

"I said peaches!"

"Are you crazy? Peaches? You're going to leave me in a pinch to buy some darn peaches?" Howard didn't know if he was more furious than dumbfounded.

"Don't get so excited, old man. High blood pressure is dangerous for you!" Duo tapped his chest with a finger and smiled cheeky, with one of those lopsided smiles of his, which he knew could always save him.

The scientist began to despair in frustration. "But we are in the middle of winter! It's impossible to find fresh peaches here now!"

Duo drew his face near the man's to make him heard. "If Death can learn how to live, then there's nothing impossible in this crazy world, my friend." Then he moved back and made spring a hand to his forehead miming a dragged salute. "Bye, bye!"

Before Howard could reply, he gave power to the engine and drove the aircraft in the air. Flying near the surface of the water for mere fun, he departed from the pontoon in a matter of seconds.

Stunned, Howard remained still staring at his helicopter that was dangerously skimming over the waves.

"But...is he completely mad? If he keeps on flying like this he'll become food for sharks!" Exclaimed a mechanic not far away.

The engineer absently scratched his sparse white hair, ruffled by the wind. "No. There's nothing to worry about it. He'll come back in one piece even this time. After a brief pause, he shook his head. "Anyway you are right on one thing: he's a stark raving mad." 

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**AN**: CIAO! Thank you for reading! (I apologize for the awkwardness of my language). If you liked it, but even if it was a torture for you, please don't be shy. I'd like to know what do you think about this.

Now for the most curious will follow the lyric of the song that so touched me with its relative translation.

**Le pesche d'inverno (by A. Celentano)**

Io finalmente ho vinto.

Qui son finiti i guai.

Non mi vergogno, ho pianto.

Tu non puoi sapere

che cosa mi è costata lei,

neanche immaginare.

Mi sono superato sai!

Woh-oh, yeah!

Tornare a respirare

e a non pensare più!

Le nuvole sul mare

se ne sono andate

con un vento che mi porta su

come un ascensore

e stavolta non ricado giù!

**Rit. Woh-oh, yeah!**

Mi vuole!

Mi vuole!

Il sole

adesso riappare!

Mi vuole!

Davvero!

Mi vuole!

Ma chi mai l'avrebbe detto...

(È matta la vita)

...che sarebbe finita così?

Du-du-du....

E giorno dopo giorno

ci credo un po' di più.

Le pesche in pieno inverno.

Non puoi prevedere

quello che non ti aspettavi mai.

Come immaginare

qualche cosa che sognar non puoi?

**Rit. ...**

**Rit. (Coro) ...**

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**Peaches in winter (by A. Celentano)**

Finally I won.

The troubles are over.

I don't feel ashamed, I cried.

You can't know 

how much it cost,

nor to imagine.

I surpassed myself!

Wo-oh, yeah!

Starting to breath again

and to don't think anymore!

The clouds on the sea 

are gone away

with a wind that bring me up

as an elevator,

and this time I don't fall again! 

**Ref. Woh-oh, yeah!**

It wants me!

It wants me!

The sun

now reappears!

It wants me!

Really!

It wants me!

But who could have ever guessed...

(Life is crazy)

...it would have ended like this?

Doo-doo-doo....

And day after day

I believe it a little more.

Peaches in the middle of winter!

You can't foresee

what you never expected.

How can you imagine

something you can't dream?

**Ref. ...**

**Ref. (Chorus)**


End file.
